McGahan took Munster as far as he could

Humiliation by a resurgent Ospreys was clearly not the sort of exit from Munster that Tony McGahan would have envisaged when he announced his departure for Australia back in February.

With a clean sweep of the Heineken Cup pool stages behind him — the first time a Munster boss had achieved that feat, and a home quarter-final against Ulster to look forward to, McGahan had every right to feel optimistic about how his final season in charge would unfold.

That McGahan’s six-year tenure with Munster, the first two of which he served under Declan Kidney, should come to such an emphatically disappointing end in Wales on Friday night will have left the Queenslander as perplexed as anyone.